Customer Reviews

The Screenplay Sell: What Every Writer Should Know

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This is the only book of which I am aware that describes truthfully the economics of the business and the way it is structured to keep out everyone, and particularly the waves of talented young people who flood to Hollywood every year, hoping to make it in the business.
It is written for the benefit of those kids, so they will understand what is going on and what they can do to crack the magic circle fame and fortune A-list.
Unless you know what you are walking into, you are doomed, no matter how talented you are, unless you are unbelievably lucky, and no one in his right mind should bet his life on odds which are that stacked against you.
Don't let anyone you care about go to Hollywood unless they have read it...

There are books written by people that have never made any movies at all and there are books that are written by people that HAVE made movies. This is a book about the second case scenario.

This is essential reading for someone interested about what its like to get your movie script up and running and produced, all the ins and outs of the movie business you need to know about. Its a no nonsense approach to the business end of movie making, nothing more and nothing less. It is brief and easy to read and gives your purely the facts. It is not some etherial, hypothetical and theoretical conceptual model of what someone thinks the movie business might be like, it is cold hard facts by someone that has done the business, writing The Thomas Crown Affair and Bullit as his major calling cards.

Only minor drawback was that some of his writing is a little hard to understand I think because he is using coloquial lingo that Im not familiar with because I dont live in the same street as him, but regardless of that it was a good quick read.

Well recommended, gives some illuminating insights into the movie world everyone wants to get into.

Two of my favorite films are "The Thomas Crown Affair" and "Bullitt." Alan Trustman wrote both of them. How lucky we are to have a screenwriter of this ilk share his thoughts on the business with us. It's a great read. I recommend it highly.

When you think of great screenwriters, Alan Trustman is right up there on the top of the list with the Goldman Brothers and Ron Bass. This is a great book. Trustman doesn't beat around the bush. He tells it the way it is for better or worse. I couldn't recommend this with any more enthusiasm.

My best friend gave me this book for my birthday. I'm an aspiring screenwriter and needed to get all the insight I could into the business. This book is great. Buy it!

This book is great. It should be required reading in all film schools. Trustman is a jewel. He combines humor with good commen sense as he provides people currently in the business and those who would to be with his read on the bis. He's not afraid to tell it the way it is. The book is a great read. It's the gold standard of all similar books I have read. I couldn't recommend it any more enthusiastically.